OpenAI and Customers Bank Forge Partnership to Automate Finance

Nearly half an hour into a conference call on Friday to discuss first-quarter results with analysts, Customers Bank CEO Sam Sidhu revealed something unusual — up until that point, he hadn’t actually been speaking.

“The prepared remarks you heard on my behalf today were delivered by my AI clone, not read by me,” Sidhu said, calling it a potential first for a public company earnings call.

The point of the stunt, he said, was to underscore a broader shift happening as Customers Bank, a $25.9 billion asset lender catering to startups and small businesses, embraces artificial intelligence.

Customers Bank has signed a multiyear partnership with OpenAI, the generative AI behemoth, which will embed engineers at the company to help it automate lending and client onboarding, as exclusively learned. This strategic alliance signals a profound integration of cutting-edge AI into core banking operations, aiming to redefine efficiency and client experience.

The deal is part of Sidhu’s aggressive strategy to get ahead of other banks in the industry’s race to transform itself using AI agents as a new digital workforce. His vision hinges on automating core banking processes—slashing loan timelines from weeks to days, for instance—and scaling growth without a commensurate increase in headcount. This approach is designed to unlock significant operational leverage and improve profitability.

While many in the financial sector have described AI’s impact in broad terms like productivity gains, Sidhu is tying it directly to tangible financial targets, demonstrating a clear return-on-investment focus.

Sidhu told CNBC that the project is expected to significantly improve the firm’s efficiency ratio, moving it from approximately 49% to the low 40s, thereby boosting the bank’s returns starting next year. This projected improvement underscores the transformative potential of AI in optimizing financial performance.

The relationship with OpenAI—which has strategically targeted finance as one of its core industries, even hiring former bankers to train its models—is poised to be a symbiotic one for the AI giant, according to the bank CEO. This collaboration represents a mutually beneficial ecosystem for innovation.

“We’re going to be co-creating enterprise solutions they could potentially sell to other banks in the future,” Sidhu said. “The goal here is end-to-end, automated agentic led workflow” for lending, deposits, and payments. This ambitious objective aims to revolutionize how financial transactions and services are managed.

OpenAI expressed pride in supporting Customers Bank “as they build a more intelligent operating model that empowers employees, strengthens client service, and sets a new standard for regional banking,” said its chief revenue officer Denise Dresser in a statement provided. This sentiment highlights the shared commitment to advancing the future of banking through AI.

The bank anticipates rolling out AI agents across its lending, deposits, and payments divisions over the next six to 12 months. This phased implementation strategy aims to ensure a smooth and effective integration of AI capabilities.

If successful, closing a commercial loan, which currently takes 30 to 45 days including underwriting, document collection, and legal negotiations, could be reduced to approximately seven days, Sidhu projected. This dramatic reduction in turnaround time is a key indicator of the efficiency gains expected from AI automation.

Furthermore, opening accounts for complex commercial clients, a process that can currently exceed a day, is expected to be collapsed to under 20 minutes utilizing conversational AI and automated document gathering. This represents a significant enhancement in client onboarding efficiency.

“When you have an autonomous agent, you’re essentially creating a digital worker… and they can work around the clock,” Sidhu emphasized. This 24/7 operational capability is a cornerstone of the AI-driven transformation, offering unparalleled responsiveness and productivity.

Customers Bank has been assiduously laying the groundwork for this strategic pivot for years. The relationship with OpenAI initially began in 2023, stemming from Sidhu’s early, albeit small, investment in the AI giant through his network in the venture capital world. The expanded partnership, formalized with the recent deal, significantly deepens their collaboration, enabling the integration of OpenAI’s AI engineers directly into the bank’s operational processes.

As a lender strategically positioned to serve the startup and venture capital community, the bank finds itself among a select group of financial institutions catering to this dynamic sector. Its proactive stance was further evidenced in 2023 when it reportedly bid for Silicon Valley Bank during the regional banking crisis, demonstrating its ambition and strategic foresight in a volatile market.

While Customers Bank is a relatively modest player compared to financial titans like JPMorgan Chase, boasting $4.9 trillion in assets, Sidhu perceives a crucial advantage for his institution. His career, which commenced at Goldman Sachs in 2004, has provided him with a deep understanding of the complexities inherent in large-scale financial operations. He contends that megabanks face significantly higher hurdles in AI implementation due to their sprawling global operations and far more intricate regulatory frameworks.

“Smaller banks are not going to be expected to have the same level of frameworks as many of the larger banks,” he observed. This regulatory landscape, he suggests, creates an environment where community and regional banks are actively encouraged by regulators “to be able to compete with larger banks.”

The lender has already achieved notable success with AI, currently employing it to generate half of the firm’s software code. This has resulted in the saving of 28,000 hours of work to date, an efficiency equivalent to not hiring approximately 15 full-time employees.

“This is an opportunity for us to potentially slow that hiring… and do more revenue per employee,” Sidhu stated, highlighting the direct correlation between AI adoption and enhanced profitability per staff member.

The bank is also actively exploring the development of new business lines that would have been prohibitively expensive to pursue prior to the advent of AI agents. These new, AI-native ventures will be managed by smaller teams overseeing automated systems, significantly reducing the human capital previously required for such operations.

Distinguishing this partnership from typical software licensing agreements, Sidhu noted that both parties are contributing resources to jointly build new tools. This collaborative approach offers OpenAI invaluable real-world use cases within the highly regulated environment of a financial institution.

“It’s going to benefit our investors. It’s going to benefit our customers,” Sidhu concluded. “Our regulators will hopefully also be happier over time, because they’re going to see us reducing risk as well.” This forward-looking perspective underscores the multifaceted benefits of their AI integration strategy.